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Distribution of pure Nash equilibria in n-person games with random best replies

Author

Listed:
  • Klaus Kultti
  • Hannu Salonen
  • Hannu Vartiainen

Abstract

In this paper we study the number of pure strategy Nash equilibria in large finite n-player games. A distinguishing feature of our study is that we allow general - potentially multivalued - best reply correspondences. Given the number K of pure strategies to each player, we assign to each player a distribution over the number of his pure best replies against each strategy profile of his opponents. If the means of these distributions have a limit (mu)i for each player i as the number K of pure strategies goes to infinity, then the limit number of pure equilibria is Poisson distributed with a mean equal to the product of the limit means (mu)i. In the special case when all best reply mappings are equally likely, the probability of at least one pure Nash equilibrium approaches one and the expected number of pure Nash equilibria goes to infinity.

Suggested Citation

  • Klaus Kultti & Hannu Salonen & Hannu Vartiainen, 2011. "Distribution of pure Nash equilibria in n-person games with random best replies," Discussion Papers 71, Aboa Centre for Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:tkk:dpaper:dp71
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    File URL: http://www.ace-economics.fi/kuvat/dp71.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Bade, Sophie & Haeringer, Guillaume & Renou, Ludovic, 2007. "More strategies, more Nash equilibria," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 551-557, July.
    2. McLennan, Andrew & Berg, Johannes, 2005. "Asymptotic expected number of Nash equilibria of two-player normal form games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 264-295, May.
    3. Stanford, William, 1997. "On the distribution of pure strategy equilibria in finite games with vector payoffs," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 115-127, April.
    4. Andrew McLennan, 2005. "The Expected Number of Nash Equilibria of a Normal Form Game," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(1), pages 141-174, January.
    5. William Stanford, 1996. "The Limit Distribution of Pure Strategy Nash Equilibria in Symmetric Bimatrix Games," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 21(3), pages 726-733, August.
    6. Powers, Imelda Yeung, 1990. "Limiting Distributions of the Number of Pure Strategy Nash Equilibria in N-Person Games," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 19(3), pages 277-286.
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    Cited by:

    1. Torsten Heinrich & Yoojin Jang & Luca Mungo & Marco Pangallo & Alex Scott & Bassel Tarbush & Samuel Wiese, 2021. "Best-response dynamics, playing sequences, and convergence to equilibrium in random games," Papers 2101.04222, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2022.
    2. Pangallo, Marco & Heinrich, Torsten & Jang, Yoojin & Scott, Alex & Tarbush, Bassel & Wiese, Samuel & Mungo, Luca, 2021. "Best-Response Dynamics, Playing Sequences, And Convergence To Equilibrium In Random Games," INET Oxford Working Papers 2021-23, Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    random games; pure Nash equilibria; n players;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C62 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Existence and Stability Conditions of Equilibrium
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

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